Since I decided to make my own reading challenge for 2024, I figured it is a good idea to figure out which books I might want to use to complete the tasks. I’m going to see how many of my own TBR books I can use, first, and how many I can do with women/LGBTQ+/BIPOC authors for as many as I can. Below are some suggestions for each task. Double-dipping is totally allowed!

Also, as I researched for books to complete these tasks, I learned that I need better definitions for some things, or that some others could be worded differently, or be defined in a broader way. Sorry about that! I will try to do better for next year’s tasks.

If you have any suggestions for any of the tasks, please share them in the comments! I love book recs!

A title longer than 6 words: The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making (Catherynne Valente)
Written by an author with your initials: Katherine Mansfield for me
The MC is an animal: The Bees (Laline Paull) or Hollow Kingdom (Kira Jane Buxton)
Takes place underwater: The Mountain in the Sea (Ray Nayler), Startide Rising (David Brin), A Darkling Sea (James L. Cambias)
Doesn’t have the letter “e” in the title: Hollow Kingdom (Kira Jane Buxton) or Loki’s Ring or any number of others on my list, I reckon. Or Gadsby by Ernest Vincent Wright if you want to read an entire book that doesn’t have an E anywhere.
By or about being a refugee: Downbelow Station (C.J. Cherryh), Girl at War (Sarah Novic), The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay (Michael Chabon), or American Dirt (Jeanine Cummins)
In translation: The Little Paris Bookshop (Nina George), The Three-Body Problem (Cixin Liu), Walking Practice (Dolki Min)
A cover featuring neon colors: The Ultimate Cyberpunk Anthology
The MC is a non-human entity (robot, alien, etc.): Murderbot! I plan to read the whole series this year. Other options are The Last Unicorn (Peter Beagle) or The Bees (Laline Paull).
Set in space: Since I mainly read sci-fi, any number of books will complete this task. The first one that comes to mind is Downbelow Station by C.J. Cherryh. Another option is The Best of All Possible Worlds (Karen Lord).
Written by an Indigenous/Native American/First Nations author: Braiding Sweetgrass (Robin Wall Kimmerer), Walking the Clouds (ed. Grace L. Dillon), or anything by Stephen Graham Jones.
An anthology: Walking the Clouds or The Ultimate Cyberpunk Anthology
Released in your birth month: March: Loki’s Ring (Stina Leicht), Infinity Gate (M.R. Carey), The Mimicking of Known Successes (Malka Older), Walking Practice (Dolki Min), A House with Good Bones (T. Kingfisher)

The title is a question: Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (PKD) or How Long ‘Til Black Future Month? (NK Jemisin)
The MC or author is transgendered: Light from Uncommon Stars (Ryka Aoki), Pet (Akwaeki Emezi), The Memory Librarian (Janelle Monae), or Bang Bang Boddhisattva (Aubrey Wood)
The weather plays a significant role: The Maddaddam trilogy (Margaret Atwood), Parable of the Sower (Octavia Butler), The Broken Earth trilogy (NK Jemisin), or The Road (Cormac McCarthy)
Has an unusual format (epistolary, choose your own adventure, etc.): Me Being Me Is Exactly As Insane As You Being You (Todd Hasak-Lowy, told in lists); Horrorstor (Grady Hendrix, told in Ikea catalog format)
The protagonist is a plant: Semiosis (Sue Burke), Legacy of Heorot (Larry Niven), the Dragonriders of Pern (Anne McCaffrey), or the Southern Reach trilogy (Jeff VanderMeer)
2024 adaptation: The Salt Path (Raynor Wynn), The Three-Body Problem (Cixin Liu), or Mickey7 (Edward Ashton)
You have no idea where you got this book: I mean, this is the majority of my TBR. I look at some of them and wonder where the fuck this book came from.
The MC has a phobia: The Yellow Wallpaper (Charlotte Perkins Gilman), Murderbot Diaries (Martha Wells), or Fangirl (Rainbow Rowell)
Set during your favorite holiday or event: A lot of sci-fi books have holidays such as a “Founder’s Day” or something similar. Pern has Hatching Day, so I might go with that. Or Something Wicked This Way Comes (Bradbury)
A one-word title: Annihilation (Jeff VanderMeer), Anathem (Neal Stephenson), or Fingersmith (Sarah Waters)
The MC is a time traveler: Long Division (Kiese Laymon), Door into Summer or Farnham’s Freehold ( both by Heinlein), or How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional World (Charles Yu)
By or about a person who is asexual: The Sound of Stars (Alecia Dow) or Guardians of the Dead (Karen Hawley)
A color in the title: The Woman in White (Wilkie Collins) or Red, White, and Royal Blue (Casey McQuiston), or Red Mars trilogy (Kim Stanley Robinson)

Published in the year of a big historical event in your lifetime: 1986: Count Zero (William Gibson) or The Physician (Noah Gordon) or Howl’s Moving Castle (Diana Wynne Jones)
The protagonist has a weird job: The Ravenmaster (Christopher Skaife), The Trauma Cleaner (Sarah Krasnostein), or Ancillary Justice (Ann Leckie)
A MC who collects something unusual: Keeper of Lost Things (Ruth Hogan)
A book that has won an LGBTQ+ literary award: Dhalgren (Samuel Delany), The Female Man (Joanna Russ), or The Sparrow (Mary Doria Russell)
Over 400 pages: Anathem or Cryptonomicon (Neal Stephenson)
A novella: Murderbot, The Seep (Chana Porter)
Written by an author who shares your zodiac sign: Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, Dan Simmons, Life on Mars (Tracy K. Smith)
Features 24 (a 24-year-old MC, or was published 24 years ago, etc): 1999: Cryptonomicon (Neal Stephenson), Flashforward (Robert Sawyer)
Women in STEM/ Girl coders, etc: Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow (Gabrielle Zevin), The Calculating Stars (Mary Robinette Kowal), Braiding Sweetgrass (Robin Wall Kimmerer)
An attention-grabbing title: Noor (Nnedi Okorafor), Cyteen or Downbelow Station (C.J. Cherryh), or Thistlefoot (GennaRose Nethercott)
Author or MC is HIV positive: The Immortals (Tracy Hickman), Push (Sapphire), or Darker Proof (Adam Mars-Jones and Edmund White)
Takes place in a haunted house: Possibly Annihilation (Jeff VanderMeer), Revelation Space (Alastair Reynolds), and there’s always The Haunting of Hill House (Shirley Jackson)
Title starts with G: Gateway (Frederik Pohl), Glory Road (Heinlein), Gnomon (Nick Harkaway), Goliath (Tochi Onyebuchi)

A book of poetry: the witch doesn’t burn in this one (Amanda Lovelace), Anne Sexton’s fairy tale poems, Life on Mars (Tracy K. Smith)
A microhistory: An Informal History of the Hugos (Jo Walton), Extra Virginity (Tom Mueller)
By or about a neurodivergent person: Ninefox Gambit (Yoon Ha Lee), The Speed of Dark (Elizabeth Moon), Rules (Cynthia Lord), A Girl Like Her (Talia Hibbert), or Happiness Falls (Angie Kim)
Book with a main character over 60 years old: Remnant Population (Elizabeth Moon), Old Man’s War (John Scalzi), The Adventures of Amina-Al-Sirafi (S.A. Chakraborthy)
It has a pretty cover: The Hazel Wood (Melissa Albert), The Last Unicorn (Peter Beagle), The Sparrow (Mary Doria Russell)
MC has a strange hobby: The Utterly Uninteresting and Unadventurous Tales of Fred, the Vampire Accountant (Drew Hayes), Mostly Dead Things (Kristen Arnett), The House of Small Shadows (Adam Nevill), The Taxidermist’s Lover (Polly Hall)
Set in a city you’ve never visited: The House of Shattered Wings (Aliette de Bodard), The Little Paris Bookshop (Nina George)
By or about a person with a mental illness: The Devil in Silver (Victor LaValle), Planetfall (Emma Newman), Outside (Ada Hoffman), Stormlight Archives (Brandon SAnderson)
A title that rhymes: Eye in the Sky (PKD), Wed, Read, and Dead (V.M. Burns), To Brie or Not to Brie (Avery Aames)
Set in a parallel universe: The Space Between Worlds (Micaiah Johnson), Ilium/Olympos duology (Dan Simmons), Interworld (Neil Gaiman and Michael Reeves)
Published in your birth year: Dinosaur Planet (Anne McCaffrey), The Persistence of Vision (John Varley), Gateway (Pohl), Lucifer’s Hammer (Niven and Pournelle)
Indie or small press published: Ancient Oceans of Central Kentucky (David Connerly Nahm), Alien Stories (E.C. Osondu), Winterset Hollow (Jonathan Edward Durham)
By or about a person on the autism spectrum: Outside (Ada Hoffman), The Speed of Dark (Elizabeth Moon), 600 Hours of Edward (Craig Lancaster)